COOKING IN SEATTLE PART I

   What a great way to start off the holiday season than to fly across the country to visit a group
of clients/friends and be asked to cook dinner for them instead of going out to dinner.  My co-
Chef Rich Fong, a fellow foodcentric and his wife Jan graciously opened up their home and
kitchen to me for this adventure.  Chef Fong mapped out a plan of attack prior to the actual
cooking of the meal...a carefully planned jaunt around Seattle procuring all the necessary
comestibles (just needed to use that word...it's a bit balsy, but I like it).  It was a great day,
although my flight in from a night of entertaining in Vancouver , B.C. was cancelled and in the
words of a few who witnessed our day, it was a bit of a quick fire challenge.  My 9:30am arrival
was delayed until 1:15 when I was picked up by Rich at Sea-Tac Airport.  Dinner for 10 was
at 6pm and Rich had prepped the Dungeness Crabs and the Porchetta, but the rest of the meal
needed to be shopped for and cooked and served by our guests' arrival time.  Happy to report
we were serving the appetizers right on time. 
In the above pic I'm in a gold mine of groceries, spices, cheeses, oils, nuts..it's Big John's P.F.I.
in Seattle...a treasure chest of ethnic delights...http://www.bigjohnspfiseattle.com/    Here I bought
some items and the cheeses for our appetizer board...The meats were going to come from
Mario Batali's family's SALUMI http://www.salumicuredmeats.com/     Since the meats would be
very assertive in spice and flavor, we chose a Provolone as the sharp cheese choice, and a
Toma Biellese as the mild cheese.  By the way, the "theme" of the meal was Giro d'Italia, a trip
around Italy so I tried to incorporate foods from the top of the Alps down to the Mediterranean
shores of Sicily.  Let me just expound for a moment on the creamy, semi-soft unctuous goodness
of this Toma.
Here I'm getting a taste...sold.
This delicious aged on silver fir board cows milk from 2 consecutive milking cheese is made
in the town of Biella, located way up in the North of Italy, in the  Piedmont region.  I'm thinking
about, not tonight of course, but  definitely in the near future of buying another piece and
doing a costolette of veal or pork stuffed with it, and maybe some truffle..later for that. 
  The look of the rind gives you the impression that it
has a brie-esque taste to it, but it did not..very smooth and mild.  In addition to the meats (again, that
will be the body of a future blogpost) I decided to slip down to Tuscany, and give our dining companions
a very Florentine white bean crostini.  Simply done, this incorporates all of the ingredients that one
will encounter if traveling through that central area of Italy:  white beans, cannellini to be exact, fresh
sage, garlic, extra virgin olive oil, a touch of chile flakes, fresh parsley, and pecorino.  That's it.   Get
yourself 2 cans of Cannellini Beans, the white kidney bean.  If you can find the imported ones from Italy
BRAVO, if not, you're not a loser...any quality can of cannellini will work...the organic brands are very
good also.  Empty the cans into a colander and run cold water over them for 1 minutes. Shake the
excess water and leave to drain for another 4 minutes. In a food processor, add 1  1/2 chopped garlic
cloves, a handful of fresh flat leaf parsley, a pinch of salt, 4 torn fresh sage leaves and a pinch of hot
red pepper flakes.  Process adding 3 tbs of extra virgin Olive Oil.  Now add 3 tbs. of grated Pecorino.
Then add the beans and process until smooth, adding more olive oil as needed, but keep the con-
sistency to where you can spread it still, over processing will make it too loose.
Taste for salt...add more if necessary, but the cheese and the residual salt in the beans should
keep you from adding more.  Let this sit at room temperature so the flavors develop.


While your spread is melding (another foodcentric word I just love to throw around) prepare your
crostini, which simply means, crouton..a piece of toasted bread. Resist the temptation to oil or
add garlic to this bread as you will take away from the earthy full flavor of the spread.  Using
good (STRESSING THE WORD GOOD) crusty Country Italian bread, cut them pieces on a bias
(looks nice, remember, it should taste good, AND look good) and toast in the oven till lightly
browned , or better yet, using a stove-top grill pan, grill the bread on both sides. Spread some
of the beans onto the bread, top with a lightly fried sage leaf if you want them served this way.
Or, dress up the bowl of cannellini with some fresh sage and parsley, a drizzle of olive oil and
have the plain crostini in a basket next to it.  Tuscan country cooking at it's finest. 



Easy holiday entertaining idea as well...incorporate this into a whole table of room temperature
antipasti, breads, cheeses.   More on the Seattle Dinner in upcoming blogs..